I always knew that I wanted to breastfeed any children I had. All of the research talks about how much healthier it is for babies with the extra immunity protection from mom and great healing properties etc. But honestly a large part of the reason I wanted to breastfeed was cost - Formula is expensive!!!
I also spent the last few years volunteering with the local Milk Bank through the Junior League of Norfolk-Virginia Beach. We volunteer on Saturdays to man donation drop offs for the Milk Bank so that mom's have the opportunity to make breast milk donations outside of normal business hours. Through this program we have really helped our milk bank grow and given lots of mom's more flexibility in when they can make donations, thus increasing the frequency of donations being made.
Specifically I volunteer with The Kings Daughter's Milk Bank at CHKD and I highly encourage you check out their website if the idea of a human milk bank makes you a little squeamish or curious about why it is important. For now I will just say that 1 ounce of human breast milk can provide 4 treatments for the average NICU infant and because of everything I learned while volunteering I was very hopeful that I would be able to not only feed my baby but be able to donate to help feed others as well.
After Little Dude's exciting entrance into this world we had more than our share of trouble getting started breastfeeding. We started life on O2 and with a feeding tube, he was quickly transitioned from the feeding tube to a bottle but Little Dude was still unable to feed at the breast for his first couple of days. I was pumping at the hospital but my milk was slow coming in so I wasn't able to pump nearly enough to cover his bottle feeds so he was receiving the .25-.5 ounce that I was able to pump followed by a bottle of formula. After a couple of days we were able to attempt breastfeeding but we had a very rough time getting Little Dude latched and on more than one occasion I almost gave up.
I will never forget one evening in the NICU trying to get him to latch, my husband was dripping sugar water down my breast to the nipple with a syringe to entice Little Dude to latch, one of the dear NICU nurses was next to me showing me how to hold my breast so that my nipple would fit more easily into Little Dude's mouth, another nurse was across from me cheering me on and tears were streaming down my face because I felt like such a failure.
Luckily once my milk came in I was able to produce enough and we only opened 2 bottles of formula after we came home from the hospital and those were both only used to get him to latch onto me, not given to him in full but I honestly didn't think we would ever be as successful as we have been with breastfeeding after that rough start.
By the time we brought Little Dude home from the hospital I was able to get him to latch with just my husband helping drip formula or expressed breast milk down my breast with a syringe (and sometimes into the corner of Little Dudes mouth to encourage him to start sucking) and by the time hubby went back to work I was mostly able to get him to feed on my own but it was painful and never quite felt "right". After about a day I was in pain and by the second day home my nipples were chapped and starting to scab over.
I was able to get an appointment with a IBCLC (International Board Certified Lactation Consultant) at the hospital where Little Dude was born and she was a life saver. She helped ease my fears that he wasn't getting enough milk by doing a weighted feed, and showed me different positions to make breastfeeding a little easier. She also was able to identify that he had a lip and tongue tie and wrote me a referral to get those fixed.
Using the tricks I learned from the IBCLC I was able to feed Little Dude successfully with less (though still some) torture to my poor abused nipples until we were able to get in with the dentist I chose to perform the tie release (generally the dentists who perform these releases use lasers which are less invasive than the cutting that is performed by ENT's and surgeons) was able to get us in. After we had Little Dude's ties released it was like I was feeding an entirely different baby.
I will admit I didn't do the best job with his stretches after we had his ties released and the lip tie has grown back slightly but it is significantly better than it was before the release and I am counting on a childhood fall to re-release it so that he doesn't have any long term cosmetic issues from the tie. As for the tongue tie I believe I did a better job stretching it and it appears to still be fully released to my untrained eye. Either way I no longer have any breastfeeding pain caused by the ties and we can just hope that if it has grown back any it isn't enough to cause any speech issues in the future.
I have now successfully breastfed my baby for over a year. I am still sending a sippy cup with expressed milk to daycare every day and breastfeeding multiple times when we are together (here's looking at you 03:00 wake ups!) I also have been able to make a few donations to the Milk Bank and gave some milk to a mom who wasn't producing enough that the Milk Bank couldn't take because it was pumped while I was sick with strep throat (they have VERY strict screening guidelines for every donation to protect the high risk NICU babies). Now I am hoping that we will be able to make it to 2 years of breastfeeding at least twice per day to keep giving Little Dude the great immunity boost from my milk. I plan to continue to pump until I go back to work in the office in January but am thinking that I will begin to wean myself off of the pump in December so that I no longer have to take time out of my in-office work day once we are back onsite.
If you want to breastfeed but are having troubles please do not hesitate to ask for help. If you can't afford an IBCLC at least reach out to a local La Leche League for free support and guidance. And if you want to breastfeed but really aren't able to because of low production or medications or any of the 100's of other valid reasons don't feel guilty. Formula is perfectly fine. It is formulated specifically to meet the needs of a baby and many perfectly healthy, well adjusted adults (especially those born in the 70's-80's-and-90's) never had anything other than formula that was less advanced than what we have today. But if you really want your child to have human milk you always have the option to check out Human Milk for Human Babies which is a milk sharing network that helps put mom's with extra milk (me) in touch with moms in need of milk.
All of this is to say - feed your baby - that's the important part :)
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